Jockey Krone Recovers From Broken Back

Published 7:00 pm, Tuesday, March 11, 2003

Hall of Fame jockey Julie Krone plans to return to riding despite breaking her back in a spill at Santa Anita.

Krone was injured when she was unseated by her mount, Sublet, at the start of Saturday's fifth race.

"She has a couple small fractures in her lower back and a couple of compressed vertebrae in the middle of her back," said her agent, Brian Beach. "She's been fitted with a back brace. It's nothing that requires surgery and the doctors expect a complete recovery.

"She definitely plans on coming back to ride. She hasn't seen a back specialist yet, that's the only thing standing in the way of having some sort of time frame. It's going to be at least a couple of months."

Krone was discharged Monday from Arcadia Methodist Hospital and hopes to see a back specialist in the near future.

""Her spirits are very good," Beach said. "I would say she's more angry than anything else because she was doing so well. She has a fiery spirit. We had some pretty good mounts lined up in the coming weeks; she's upset that she's going to miss them."

The sport's winningest female jockey, Krone resumed riding in November after being retired for 3 1/2 years. Before her spill, she was fifth in the jockey standings at Santa Anita for the meet.

She has ridden 3,595 winners in her career.

She was inducted into the thoroughbred racing Hall of Fame in 2000, the first woman to be enshrined. Among her victories was the 1993 Belmont Stakes, when she became the first woman to win a Triple Crown race.

She had two spills in the mid-1990s that led to her retirement after 18 years as a jockey.

Two months after winning the Belmont, Krone was seriously injured at Saratoga. She shattered her right ankle, bruised her heart and punctured an elbow. The ankle injury required two steel plates and 14 screws to repair.

Just 13 days after her return in 1995, Krone broke both hands when thrown from her mount at Gulfstream Park.

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Krone was the second high-profile rider to be injured in a fall at Santa Anita this month. Laffit Pincay Jr., broke two bones in his neck March 1 when his horse fell in a grass race. The injury has threatened the career of the 56-year-old rider, whose 9,531 victories are the most in thoroughbred racing history.